The Painting
by Lilypad18
Summary: While taking a day off from traveling time and space, the Doctor and Rose go to a museum. However, when strange things start to happen, the Doctor and Rose discover that this museum holds more than meets the eye.


Rose let out a long sigh as her eyes slid around the museum gallery. Tall, elegant marble pillars shot up into the air, connecting with the plaster ceiling in order to hold up the roof. Cracks seemed to emanate from everywhere, making Rose wonder how much longer the roof with continue to stand. If there was one thing she knew for certain, it was that time is the great destroyer.

Her eyes floated to the crowds of people that huddled around different paintings. While it was late in the morning, a good amount of people were occupying the space. Aside from their hushed chatter, Rose could hear the continuous patter of rain as it fell onto the building. Although she was happy to be out of the rain, as well as her hair, she would rather be traveling time, seeing different worlds and places, but the Doctor decided that today would be an _off_ day.

Rose pushed herself off of a bare wall before walking over to the Doctor. At this point, he had his glasses on and as he was closely investigating this painting, he had his face directly a couple of inches in front of it as if he needed to see every color and every brush stroke the picture obtained. Rose's lips pulled into a small smile at his sense of childish curiosity; she stuffed her hands into the pockets of her spring coat.

"You know, if you continue to squint that hard, your eyes may stay like that." Rose pulled a hand from her pocket and gestured to the Doctor's eyes with her pointer finger. The Doctor drew away from the picture and gave Rose one of his toothy grins, shoving his hands in the deep pockets of his long coat.

"That is what humans always tend to think, but it is actually untrue. It is physically impo-" The Doctor stopped his rambling explanation when he watched Rose's head tilt, her lips falling into a line. He usually took this movement of hers that she isn't interested. The Doctor knew that she would usually be patient with his spouting facts, but he felt that today was different, so he became quiet. Rose's lips pulled into a smile.

"So, why were you studying that picture so intensely? Is there something wrong with it?" The Doctor plucked off his glasses before safely securing them in his breast pocket. His eyes found Rose while he smiled.

'This picture is very important because I was there while it was being painted!" His smile grew as he rocked back and forth on his heels with that same sense of childish excitement. "I only wanted to make sure it was the _real_ copy." Rose's eyebrows rose with amusement and as she smiled, the tip of her tongue went in between her teeth. She slowly shook her head and shrugged her shoulders before her eyes flicker up to the time lord's face.

"Well, that is certainly impressive to say the least, Doctor." She slowly nodded her head in approval before she looked around the room. Her eyes then flung back to the Doctor once she saw him unsheathe his screwdriver from his pocket. The same blue light flickered on at his pointed it at the painting. He got up real close again, so close, that the tip of the advanced screwdriver nearly touched the canvas. Rose was immediately alert.

"Doctor," she warned, resting a hand on top of his, preventing him to get any closer to the aging piece of art. She opened her mouth to say more, but a corpulent security guard walked over to them. When Rose got a good look at him, he looked stiff and his eyes were vacant. Nevertheless, he turned to the Doctor with a stern finger pointed at him.

"Put the sonic screwdriver away." His threat was meaningless to them because of his unusual monotone voice. Rose considered that some security guards would be completely bored with this job, but not so bored that their voices would sound like this. "No alien technology is allowed in this exhibit." And with the finale of his warning, he turned around and awkwardly shuffled away. Rose and the Doctor watched as he perched into a corner of the exhibit and once he did, he seemed to almost turn off. Rose's eyes grew wide at watching the security guard act abnormal like this and as her eyes skirted around the room, she discovered that the entirety of the people who had been here a couple of minutes ago were no longer seen in the room. Even though it was a museum and people had the liberty to leave and go see other art, Rose thought it was on the weirder side that they all left at the same time. Her eyebrows came together and she turned to the Doctor.

"Well, something definitely smells fishy around here," She mused, resting her hands on her hips. "And it's certainly not the fish and chips coming from the café downstairs." She looked up at her alien companion in order to see his response.

"Yes," He agreed, bobbing his head as he looked around, his lips together. Aside from the odd bloke of a security guard they had both witnessed, he already noticed the strange things the young girl did. He didn't need his screwdriver to pick up the fact that other weird things were happening in this museum. No human ever could know about his sonic screwdriver, except his companions, because it is advanced Time Lord technology. He sighed and looked down at his companion, "I know I said this would be our day off, but I guess we're _just_ going to have to investigate." There was a hint of disappointment lingering in his tone, but Rose could tell he was excited with the prospect of figuring this situation out. He tried to contain this excitement with a subtle smile. Rose matched his smile as she nodded. She was glad that she wouldn't be spending the rest of the day looking at paintings, but instead helping the Doctor save the world like their normal schedule nowadays.

"There's nothing else I would rather do," Rose promised with one nod of her head. This motion caused her bangs to fall into one of her eyes. The Doctor continued to look down at her, his smile growing.

"Good," the Doctor said and linked their arms together. "Allons-y!" Together, the pair walked out of the exhibit, both of their sneakers squeaking against the floor.

ere...


End file.
